I’ve been having some problems with flighty birds recently. Actually one is a penguin and the other is a dragon. Here they are, together for the first time:

Original Tux on the left

I created the penguin in early 2009, working on a tiny EeePC, running Linux. I was actually taking a stab at improving the look of Tux, but he went in a different direction.

The dragon was created in early 2010, to look like the familiar Twitter bird, but with a unique Welsh dragon spin.

Both images have gone on to be pretty popular on the web, used for avatars in forums, on Twitter and so on. I deliberately licensed both as Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike. This means that people are welcome to use the images, for free, on condition that they provide a proper credit, and do not seek to profit directly or indirectly from use of my work. Also, they must make any derivative work available under the same terms.

The continuing misadventures of ‘Boggle’

These conditions seem more than reasonable to me, but I’ve spotted examples of people either not knowing or not caring that they are violating this very liberal licence, especially with the cartoon penguin design. There was a guy selling penguin t-shirt prints, and then only last month I found an iPhone game and a Mac software house using him. I ended up giving permission to the latter – they seemed nice enough.

The original Cartoon penguin post had actually become one of my most popular pages, bringing in 100+ hits per day via Google image search… until a few days ago I noticed this had stopped! Compare the following images:

This is how the image search for 'cartoon penguin' looked last month (September 2011).

SEO surgery

Clearly the guy is no designer or SEO expert, but he has managed to outrank me for my own image! I’m assuming he’s winning because the image is near the top of the page in the title area (that appears on every page), and he’s renamed the image ‘cartoon-penguin.jpg‘, whereas my original is the less useful ‘penguin_finished_012.png‘.

Last night I optimised my site a little in an attempt to win back favour. I also contacted Mr. Bowlofcarrots via his site and Tumblr support, though I don’t really expect any joy from either of them.

It’s surprised me how annoyed I am by this minor injustice. After all, this is an image I was happy enough to give away for free. It occurred to me that even though this Tumblr user isn’t attempting to ‘steal’ my work in the same way as some previous people have, he has nonetheless taken it from me in a more real sense. Quite innocently, he has robbed me of my sense of ownership of the image itself. It’s very frustrating.

I asked people on Twitter if I should be upset about this – after all, this is another of my ‘free’ designs, and @thisiswales didn’t actually seem to be for any kind of profit.

It turned out that most were more outraged on my behalf than I was! (Thanks everyone!)

In the process of complaining, I may have upset the account’s owner, but he did remove my design later that day as he promised he would. Well, kind of. As I write this I notice that the background image still contains my work, but I think I’ll declare victory anyway.

So what?

I do realise both of these cases are pretty trivial. It’s not like Paperchase or Urban Outfitters have stolen my work to be used to fuel their profit machine. In the worst case, a blogger has been denied 100 hits a day that weren’t really contributing anything of real value anyway.

But it’s frustrating to offer something for free, yet still have it taken without permission asked or credit given, especially when the casual theft can have a negative impact on me. It makes me want to use a more traditional full-copyright licence, and go after people who take the piss.

I wonder where they’ll turn up next?

UPDATE 2011.10.18: Tumblr got back to me; they have suspended the blog that was using my penguin image. A bit harsh perhaps, but I’m not going to complain. It will be interesting to see if I regain my ranking (or if Mr. Clipart manages to get his Tumblr blog reinstated).

A group of classical music lovers have successfully appealed for funds to release copyright-free versions of symphonies by four famous composers. The money will pay for an orchestra to record the music on an “all rights basis”.

The project, Musopen, aims to deal with a problem caused by the way copyright laws work. Although the actual symphonies written by composers in, for example, the 19th century are long out of copyright, there is separate protection for every individual performance by an orchestra. That means that in most cases, the only recordings currently in the public domain are very old performances generally recorded with poor quality equipment and plagued with hiss and crackle.

The song opens with two young females discussing the physical appearance of a third female, in particular her buttocks, which they find unfathomably large.

In the opening verse, Sir Mix-a-Lot professes his affinity for large buttocks and his inability to disguise this fact from others. He goes on to describe other desirable physical attributes, such as a trim waistline, tight-fitting garments, and unblemished skin. Though the song does not contain a distinct narrative, the author does visit recurring themes, such as female body image as depicted in media, male attitudes toward dating and relationships, and the author’s own sexual prowess.

In later verses he expresses his exasperation with the entertainment industry’s portrayal of the ideal female form. He soundly rejects the notion promulgated by fashion magazines that diminutive buttocks are more desirable. His critique of the women who appeared in contemporary music videos is particularly scathing, likening their appearance to those of prostitutes. To further illustrate his point, he stipulates that the purported ideal proportions of 36-24-36 (measuring the bust, waist, and hip circumferences respectively) would only be pleasing on women with a standing height no greater than 63 inches.

Mix-a-Lot also briefly touches upon the roles that ethnicity, nutrition, and physical fitness play in determining the shape and size of the female buttocks. He recommends that any exercises performed should be limited to the abdominal area. He cautions against a fitness routine strenuous enough to diminish the heft of the gluteal muscles. Though he offers no broad dietary guidelines, Mix-a-Lot contends that the dish “red beans and rice” is an important food staple for maintaining healthy buttocks.

Various lyrics address the fact that some men find no intrinsic value in large buttocks and consequently express a lack of interest. Mix-a-Lot makes clear that he would eagerly strike up relations with any woman overlooked or discarded by such men. The remainder of the narrative is fleshed out with the author’s various attempts to entice women into enjoying a ride in his luxury automobile. [3]

I think he’s actually made some pretty nice tweaks to it: The sketched look works really well, he’s improved the beak a bit and the positioning of the feet. The plaster is a nice touch too. It’s still clearly mine though.

Update 2012.09.22: Get tall versions of these for your shiny new iPhone 5! If you liked having a plain background on your iPhone, these wallpapers may work for you. I’m using the one with the Apple logo for my lock … Continue reading →

I’ve spent this evening working on a cartoon penguin in Inkscape. I’ll release this with a liberal Creative Commons licence and as an SVG when I’m sure I’m happy with it. I’ve also attached my work in progress for those who may be curious. Any constructive criticism is welcomed. :)

I find myself at this site every time I need a name for an Elder Scrolls or Dragon Age character, etc, but it's actually an incredible resource for writers of fantasy and science fiction works looking for not just character names, but place names, vehicle names, drink names, drug dames, disease names and many, many more.

Inform is a design system for interactive fiction based on natural language. It is a radical reinvention of the way interactive fiction is designed, guided by contemporary work in semantics and by the practical experience of some of the world's best-known writers of IF.

Storyspace 3 is a tool for writing and reading hypertext narrative, for fictional and nonfictional stories told with links. Long the tool of choice for serious hypertext writers, Storyspace now offers new features, new tools, and unmatched elegance for handling complex stories with ease.